


round one

by melodiousb



Category: Men's Hockey RPF, 방탄소년단 | Bangtan Boys | BTS
Genre: Alternate Universe of an Alternate Universe, M/M, Stanley Cup Playoffs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-14
Updated: 2019-05-14
Packaged: 2020-03-05 11:34:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18827869
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/melodiousb/pseuds/melodiousb
Summary: yoongi + hank 5ever





	round one

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ifonlynotnever](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ifonlynotnever/gifts).
  * Inspired by [(glove) save me](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17934134) by [ifonlynotnever](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ifonlynotnever/pseuds/ifonlynotnever). 



> Happy birthday, Ras! Your presence in my life improves it.

Yoongi is halfway down the handshake line before he realizes. He probably owes his brain a thank you for the fact that he’s been able to think about anything else for the past week. He slows down until he feels Gabe pushing him from behind.

“C’mon, Mini,” Gabe whispers. “I’ve got nothing to say to these guys.”

Yoongi doesn’t, really, either. He knows most of the Rangers, is casually friendly with some, but he couldn’t care less about them. He does get a long, warm hug and no words from Brady. Brady’s a good kid. And then there's Henrik.

Yoongi doesn’t even meet Henrik’s eyes before Henrik is pulling him into a hug. He’s always like this, acting like they’re friends, acting like he cares about Yoongi. Yoongi has never been able to deal with it. There’s a reason Henrik is the only one of his idols he hasn’t made friends with.

Anyway, he’s crying. He doesn’t think his tears are going to show on Henrik’s sweaty jersey, but they’re absolutely going to show on Yoongi’s face.

“This wasn’t on you,” Henrik says, against Yoongi’s ear. “You did good. You’re so good, Yoongi.”

“Shut up,” Yoongi chokes out, and laughs. “Win this--” he almost says “for me,” but he stops himself in time. “I want to see you win this.” And then he’s skating forward, wiping his face on his jersey sleeve like that’s going to make shaking hands with Georgiev any less humiliating.

-

Yoongi does what you do when you’re eliminated from the playoffs. He goes home. He saves getting drunk about it for tomorrow, or the next day. He lets Jin try to make him feel better, knowing that Jin is feeling shitty, too, and he’ll feel worse if Yoongi shuts him down.

He cleans out his locker. He answers questions on camera, knowing all the reporters are expecting him to shoulder the responsibility for the loss. And he was responsible, of course, but it leaves a funny taste in his mouth, especially when he thinks about Henrik telling him it wasn’t his fault. People kept calling this series a goalie duel, like Yoongi was on the same level as Henrik. He can be proud of that.

And then, a few days later, he sits down to watch the first game of the Rangers’ series against the Pens.

“You don’t have to watch it,” Jin points out.

“I want to,” says Yoongi. That’s not strictly true, but Yoongi isn’t in the mood to explain that there have only ever been a few acceptable excuses for missing Rangers playoff games, and being sad was never one of them.

The Rangers lose, and Yoongi feels worse, but it’s okay. He probably would have felt bad if they’d won, too. They’re in Pittsburgh for the first two games, and Yoongi hasn’t experienced that since he was a backup, but he remembers how shitty it feels to lose a playoff game and have nowhere to go but a hotel room. 

He’s in bed already when the phone rings. If it was a text, he would ignore it. But it’s not a text, and it’s Henrik. Henrik has never called him before. Yoongi didn’t know Henrik had his number.

“Hello?” he says.

“Did you watch?” Henrik asks.

Yoongi has Henrik’s number because Jungkook had them both in a short-lived groupchat when they all had to be at the same event. He guesses Henrik saved Yoongi’s then, too. “Yeah, I watched,” he says.

Hank doesn’t answer, but Yoongi can hear him breathing. He’s too tired for this. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”

“You don’t have to say anything,” says Henrik. Then he says, “You would have had the game winner.”

Maybe he would have. He’d thought at the time that he would have gone for the glove save there. “Maybe,” he says. “But I wouldn’t have had that save on Hagelin at the end of the second.” That had been one of those saves that fans take for granted because the goaltender makes it look easy. Yoongi knows it wasn’t easy.

“Oh, well,” Henrik says. “I couldn’t let Hags score on me.” 

Yoongi gets that. He hates when other Korean players in the league score on him. Former teammates, too. And Hagelin is both of those things, for Henrik.

“Doesn’t matter, anyway,” he says. “You’ll get the next one.”

“Will I?” says Henrik.

“Would I say it if it wasn’t true?” Yoongi asks. He covers his mouth and yawns.

“You wouldn’t,” says Henrik. He’s smiling, Yoongi can tell. “Thanks, Yoongi.”

It just goes to show how little Henrik knows him. Yoongi will lie about a lot of things, will always lie about this. “You’re welcome,” he says, to dead air.

-

The Rangers win game two, and probably would have even if Henrik wasn’t quite as good--the final score is 5-1--but Henrik is very, very good. Yoongi feels oddly like the victory is his, too. He’d thought his divided loyalties thing was getting better, but obviously it’s not.

He waits to go to bed--10:30, 11, 11:30. It’s after twelve when Henrik calls. “You’re my good luck charm,” he says.

“Okay,” says Yoongi. “Only for this playoff run, though.”

Henrik laughs. “We’ll see.”

The Rangers beat the Penguins in five games. Henrik calls Yoongi after every one.

-

The conference finals start in Boston. Yoongi takes a nap after the Rangers win game one. He knows he has time before Henrik calls. But he doesn’t really wake all the way up again, so when Henrik says, “You are my good luck charm. I really believe it,” his brain is still sleep-muddled and he doesn’t know what to say.

“I don’t understand you,” Yoongi says. “I’ve never understood you.”

“Yoongi--” says Henrik. “I’m easy.”

“You’re not.”

“You understand me better than you think.”

“I don’t know what that means,” says Yoongi.

Henrik laughs. “That’s okay,” he says. “Thanks for talking, Yoongi. Go back to sleep now.”

Henrik always says Yoongi’s name. A lot of guys avoid it, or come right out and tell him they can’t pronounce it. Yoongi doesn’t think it’s a hard name to pronounce; they just don’t want to try. Henrik doesn’t seem to have trouble with it, anyway. He says it all the time, like he’s using it to emphasize that he knows who he’s talking to, and he’s glad it’s Yoongi.

-

The Rangers drop the next two, but when Yoongi says, “I guess my good luck has worn off,” Henrik says, “I don’t think it has.”

“You lost,” Yoongi points out. “Twice.”

“So tell me I’ll win the next one,” Henrik says. He pauses. “Unless you don’t think I will.”

“No, I do,” says Yoongi, and he means it. “I really do.”

-

Hank wins game four in New York, and game five in Boston. He loses game six in New York, with Yoongi in a private suite, facemask on and hat pulled low. He makes it home just before Henrik calls.

“I was there tonight,” he says, when he picks up the phone.

“Then I wish we’d won for you,” says Henrik.

“You wish you’d won anyway,” says Yoongi.

“I wish I’d won for an extra reason now,” says Henrik. “Where did you sit? The press box?”

“A suite,” says Yoongi. “My face was covered. I got a few looks.” Even isolated in a suite, the atmosphere was...really something. “I dreamed about going to a Rangers playoff game when I was a kid,” he says. “But this was the first time.”

Henrik’s breath sounds heavy, through the phone. “I wish…” he says, and trails off.

“What do you wish?”

“A lot of things,” Henrik says. “Never mind.”

“You were good.” Yoongi doesn’t know what else to say. “I love watching you.”

“Yoongi…” says Henrik. “Do you really want us to win?”

If he’d said “me,” Yoongi would have said yes, but hearing “us,” he takes a moment to think about it. “I really do,” he says, finally. “I shouldn’t, but I do.”

“Can I come over?” Henrik asks.

-

Yoongi doesn’t know why Henrik is here. He’s not sure Henrik does, either. He doesn’t seem to have anything to say. Yoongi offers him a drink, tea, something to eat. They compromise on tea with a splash of whiskey. It’s chilly for May. It’s awkward, and Yoongi wishes Jin was here to smooth things out, but Jin’s gone home for a couple of weeks. And at the same time--Yoongi is glad it’s just him and Henrik, and no one else knows he’s here.

Henrik talks about Pittsburgh, and Boston, and San Jose, who have just won their series against the Jets. He talks about the exhaustion that sets in after the first couple of rounds, and the single-minded focus you need to offset it. Yoongi stops him, eventually, because he’s never been past the first round and Henrik is sounding increasingly like he’s complaining. Then they sit in silence until Henrik finished his drink, puts the mug down on the table, leans over, and kisses Yoongi.

_Oh_ , thinks Yoongi, and kisses him back. Then he does something he’s wanted to do for ten whole years: runs his fingers through Henrik’s hair. He giggles against Henrik’s mouth.

“What?” says Henrik, smiling at him, ready to share the joke. 

Yoongi shakes his head. “Your hair feels different than I thought it would,” he says.

“Good or bad?”

“Really good,” says Yoongi, and kisses him again.

-

“Was this why you wanted to come over?” Yoongi asks, some time later. He’s always envied Henrik’s height, but it turns out his head fits perfectly against Henrik’s shoulder.

“Partly,” says Henrik. His traces a finger around the edge of Yoongi’s ear, and down his neck to his shoulder. Yoongi grabs his hand and holds onto it.

“Was this why you kept calling me?”

Hank doesn’t answer, and Yoongi twists to look at him. “Why did you call?” he asks.

“Because you looked at me differently, in the handshake line.”

“Differently how?”

“I always thought you didn’t like me much,” says Henrik. “I spent a long time trying to get you to warm up to me, but I was never sure if it was working.”

“I’ve always liked you,” says Yoongi. “As a fan, and then as a…” Colleague? Friend? “Person,” he finishes.

“You never let me see it, until--”

“I wasn’t--hiding anything. Then.”

“Ah,” says Henrik. “Are you done hiding from me now, then?”

“That depends,” says Yoongi. “Are you winning me a cup?”

“Yes,” says Henrik, with no trace of uncertainty in his voice.

“Well then,” says Yoongi, fully turning now, and straddling Henrik’s hips. “You can have anything you want from me.”

“I just want you,” Henrik says, pulling him down for a kiss. 

Yoongi doesn’t tells Henrik that he’s got him, that he’s always had him. There will be time for that later. He says, “I think that an be arranged,” and kisses him back.


End file.
